Father refutes prisoner's testimony

Friday

Dec 10, 2004 at 12:01 AM

By Jefferey McMurray The Associated Press

WASHINGTON | The father of CIA/sofficer Johnny "Mike" Spann, the first American killed in the Afghanistan war, said Thursday he has a video that/sdisproves an inmate's account of the prison riot that led to his son's death.

In an interview with The Associated Press, Johnny Spann, of Winfield, Ala., said the video he/sobtained from the/sPentagon shows the uprising clearly started in the prison building, not the courtyard where his son was seen on the tape moments earlier.

That seems to contradict the newly released testimony of a man questioned by the FBI at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, in connection with the Nov. 25, 2001, uprising.

According to him, the riot began when Spann shot and killed an attacking prisoner.

"It's important to understand this was not a spontaneous uprising," Spann said. "This thing was planned from the night before."

Spann said sounds of gunfire and a grenade blast are audible on the tape before it cuts off.

The sounds appear to be coming from the building, he said, because the doctors and soldiers in the courtyard being filmed at the time instantly turn their heads to look toward the prison.

He says this account was verified by several people he spoke with during a 2002 visit to Afghanistan, including two Afghan doctors who were treating capture Taliban soldiers and a Northern Alliance leader -- all of whom were there.

If the story of the inmate at Guantanamo were accepted as fact, it could potentially help the appeal of John Walker Lindh, the American now serving a 20-year prison term for aligning with the Taliban.

News footage shows Spann interviewing Lindh in the hours before the prison riot, and Spann's father argued Lindh should be treated as a traitor because he didn't warn his son about the uprising.

According to the inmate, whose testimony is buried in hundreds of pages of U.S. government memos released this week by the American Civil Liberties Union, Spann "was jumped by an Arab or Pakistani male, but the armed man [Spann] shot the prisoner. People began running and chaos ensued."

Although Spann's father says he has no doubts about where the riot began, the circumstances of how his son died remain a little more murky. He says autopsy reports reveal he was killed by gunshots to the head, more consistent with an execution-style killing than a gunfight.